Bristol Consultant: Downtown Plan Unlikely To Work

BRISTOL — After analyzing the downtown housing market, a consultant on Monday recommended that the city reject the current version of Renaissance Downtowns' redevelopment plan.

The financing documents in Renaissance's proposal for a 100-unit apartment building assume rents and occupancy rates far higher than what exists in the surrounding neighborhood, according to a report by Goman & York Property Advisors.

Even if Renaissance could immediately lease out 95 percent of the apartments at the full rates of $1,100 to $1,500 a month, there's still a strong doubt that the project could repay taxpayers for the roughly $6 million that Renaissance wants in public financing, the report said.

The first phase of Renaissance's plan falls far short of the broadscale makeover that downtown would need to attract fresh commercial and retail growth, according to the firm.

"All you're going to do is air-drop a 100-unit building onto the south side of the site. There's got to be a lot more going on with it," said Michael Goman, head of the consulting firm.

City council members appeared disappointed but not shocked by the report, which was commissioned by Mayor Ken Cockayne this summer after Renaissance announced it would need substantial public investment to go forward.

Renaissance was given no opportunity to respond to the report at a council meeting Monday evening, but Cockayne said he anticipates the public and Renaissance will get to offer comments and questions at a special meeting on Sept. 15.

For several years, Renaissance has been trying to line up a team of investors, builders and prospective commercial tenants to lead a redevelopment of the roughly 15-acre site where the Bristol Centre Mall once stood.

But the weak economy, a nationwide pullback in retail expansion, and the relatively downscale demographics of the surrounding neighborhood have all hindered the project.

Some local critics of Renaissance have accused the company of trying to build low-income housing under the guise of market-rate housing. But Goman & York's review showed quite the opposite: The Renaissance plan envisions modern, high-end apartments renting at roughly twice the cost of surrounding housing.

Tenants aren't easy to get for even the existing low-cost apartments, the Goman & York report said: The area within a few minutes' drive of Renaissance has a 14 percent vacancy rate in its rental housing, far above the state and citywide averages.

"Can you jump from $650 a month up to $1,100 a month for a studio or $1,500 for a one-bedroom? That's a big leap," Goman said.

Renaissance started off several years ago with artists' renderings of a vast complex of mid-rise apartment towers with first-floor restaurants stores, a 100-room hotel, landscaped walkways and a large public plaza as a centerpiece. But it quickly said the project would have to be done in stages, and in the past two years has downsized the first phase to include a single 100-unit apartment building with perhaps two small shops.

Goman & York said that wouldn't be enough to lure the people who are likely to want upscale urban living.

But Goman emphasized that Renaissance's development team is skilled and experienced, and indicated that Bristol probably couldn't get any better offer if it put the project out to a new contract. Instead, he said Bristol should reject the current plan and instead work with Renaissance on a new concept: Using the mall site as a large public park and plaza, while redeveloping some of the older, vacant or half-vacant buildings into apartments at more realistic rent levels.